


One Singular Mess

by bitboozy



Series: Domesticated [24]
Category: Broadchurch
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Family, Gen, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-26
Updated: 2019-09-29
Packaged: 2020-10-28 18:50:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,618
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20783405
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitboozy/pseuds/bitboozy
Summary: While Ellie adjusts to their engagement and thinks about their next steps, Alec is determined to propose to her properly.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Immediately follows the last chapter of "Experimental Investigations." 
> 
> I was rewatching series 2 the other night with a friend, who was watching it for the first time, and she said, "So series two is just a series about how Alec Hardy looks at Ellie Miller. Right? Is there anything else going on?" And I was like NOPE THAT'S IT, THAT'S SERIES 2. Soooo you might see some of that in this story somehow, I don't know.
> 
> Probably two or three chapters here, we'll see! Thanks for reading, all!

“So.”

“So.”

He raises their hands and interlaces their fingers.

“Bloody helluva night, eh?”

She nods her head slowly, with a smile, then untangles their legs so that she can crawl onto his lap and straddle him.

“You really wanna do this, El?” He questions her with slight trepidation.

“Shag you? Oh, yeah.”

He sighs. “_No_.”

She does. Actually. She really does. She doesn’t quite know when it happened. This was the one thing she thought she’d never waver on. Moving in together, sure. Having another baby…wow, but okay. Kissing a woman…yeah, why not. But marriage?

Her certainty began to fade with time, her staunch opposition to marriage he chipped away at day after day. As time went on and their relationship continued to deepen, she began to consider all the ways in which they already _were_ married. And she used that as an excuse for why they didn’t need to be. They could have it all, but without the paperwork and the anxiety. But every day her conviction began to weaken. When her father brought it up, so wildly insulted that they would choose to have a child together without even considering marriage, she felt a twinge of something. When Alec said he _would_ marry her, but not that he wanted to, she felt another twinge. And she took it out on him. She raged at him for changing his mind without telling her. But she knows that he likely had no idea that he _had_ changed his mind until suddenly it poured out of him. Which is exactly how she feels now.

They’d vowed again never to marry after that. She needed to double-down on the notion, to push it out of her mind. But then every morning she’d wake up and feel a bit naked without a ring on her finger. She’d feel this odd sense of being unmoored anytime she had to describe to people what he was to her. _Partner_, no, too on the nose. _Boyfriend_, no, too adolescent. _Significant other_, ugh, no. Instead she’d falter. And never feel quite right about it. He is so much to her. To not have a word for it felt like she was doing him a disservice.

When she got pregnant, she’d wanted to be married even less. The baby was enough to tether them, she thought. Just like paperwork, only screams all night long. Getting pregnant meant they didn’t have to prove their love to anyone through marriage. They’d _made_ something that could be the living, breathing manifestion of it. No ring, no ceremony, no _paperwork_ could compare.

Then Ellie wondered if maybe she just hated paperwork. 

So much. 

“I really want do this,” she tells him finally. “A lot, like really a lot.”

The grin on his face only confirms her decision. She wants to eat him up.

“When did you change your mind?” He asks, running his hands up and down her back.

“Now. Tonight. Honestly.” She takes his face in both her hands. She resists pinching his cheeks and smushing them up. “Listening to you. _You_ changed my mind.”

He manages to blush in her hands. “…Changed mine a while ago.” 

She smiles. “I know, love.” She rubs his cheek with her thumb. “Sorry it took me so long to catch up.”

“Wouldn’t have guessed _I’d_ be the soppy one in the relationship, hm?” He kisses her.

She smirks. “Oh no I’d have guessed." 

He appears mildly insulted, but distracted by her smooth skin. “You’re the one who cries all the time,” he murmurs, leaning forward to kiss her chest.

She laughs. Because it’s true. “Always knew you were so grumpy _because_ you were secretly so soppy. Because you didn’t know how to express it.”

“Now I do.” He says it directly into her skin and she can barely make it out.

“Yes, the dam has been broken now,” she says, biting her lip because his beard is tickling her skin. “It used to come out of you in odd ways, you know.” 

He pulls back a little to look at her, hair mussed and eyes narrowed. “Did not.”

Ellie laughs out loud. “Of course it did!” She places both palms flat on his chest. “When you stayed up with me for _two hours_ after Joe was arrested, just talking to me, just letting _me_ talk. When you followed me to my bloody therapy appointment. When you’d check to make sure I’d eaten and then when you made dinner for me yourself to see that I did. When you pushed Fred in his pram. The way you looked at me when I was on the stand. The massive expression of _guilt _on your face when they accused us of having an affair, but only to me and not to you. Guilt, not horror. You weren’t even stunned. You were just…sorry. Like you’d somehow seen it coming and wished to hell they’d interrogated you about it instead of me.” She pauses to take a breath. “Every single time you reached out to me, literally, and I brushed you away. Still you kept on doing it.”

Alec scoffs, deflecting. “And you want to marry that soppy sod?”

“Want to do more than _that_,” she replies, leaning forward to kiss his neck and his collarbone.

He slips a hand under her tank top and traces the length of her spine. “You like the mess,” he says suddenly. “Is why you didn’t want to get married.”

She stops what she’s doing and looks up at him, question marks in her eyes.

“You don’t like the whole ‘married with a baby on the way’ thing. Admit it.”

Ellie has never thought about it quite this way. But when she hears him say it, she realizes it is absolutely, unquestionably true. “No. Too tidy. Too cute.”

“And we’re not cute,” Alec says definitively.

“We bloody well are not!” She agrees with a stern nod. “We’re messes, you and I. I like that we’re messes, I wear it like a badge of honor now.”

He traces her jawbone down to her chin, knowing his touch will soften her stubborn expression. And it does.

“Now we’re _a _mess,” he says. “One singular mess.”

She ventures a smile. “…Guess I can accept that.” Unconsciously she grinds her hips into his. “Rather nice actually.”

He regards her with great amusement. “That’s turnin’ you on, isn’t it? Us bein’ a mess.”

She taps his nose with her index finger. “Us being a _singular_ mess. Just one great big mess altogether.” She kisses him. “Me, you, the kids, even the baby. What a disaster.”

She kisses him again and he reaches for the nape of her neck and holds her there so he can deepen the kiss. And maybe shut her up. She leans her whole weight against him, pushing him flush against the headboard when he slips his tongue into her mouth. He pulls her tank top off over her head, then flings it across the room.

“What do you think – will happen – the _next _time we – go four days without – having sex?” He asks between kisses, enjoying the feel of her bare breasts against his chest.

“Why are you talking,” she replies, trying to occupy his tongue elsewhere.

He grasps her face and guides it back. “Only so many times you can kiss a woman and then propose to me.”

She frowns. “Not what I did.”

With a knowing smile, he reaches out and starts taking the pins out of her hair, leaving them on the nightstand. “Oh you definitely kissed a woman.”

“Dunno why you do that,” she comments with mild annoyance. “You take out the bloody pins and then you just keep trying to push my hair out of my face. That’s what they’re for you know.”

He pulls out the last one and replies, defensively, “If you get accidentally slammed into the headboard, they _hurt_ you.”

She is largely unmoved. “Then don’t accidentally slam me into the bloody headboard.”

“The word _accident_ is in there for a reason, Ellie.” 

She looks away from him stubbornly. “Then you should be more careful with me.”

He nearly laughs out loud. “You don’t _want _me to be more careful with you!” He studies her expression, the knowing smile on his face goes nowhere. “You’re just pissed off now because I accused you of proposin’.”

“_Accused me_,” she protests, leaning back a bit. She’d like to fold her arms across her chest to display her objection but she’s topless and she knows it would just look stupid. “See, you said it, not me.” 

“It’s okay that you proposed, Ellie.”

“I did no such thing.”

He runs his hands up and down her arms, trying to soothe her. Which she is having none of. She shrugs him off.

“Are we not gettin' married?” He asks, the challenge clearly presented in his tone of voice.

She sighs. “We are.”

“And how did we get there?”

Despite her frustration, she makes no move to get off of his lap. She says still where she is. “…I made a _suggestion_. Offered up a _possibility_.”

“_Proposed_.” He’s grinning now and she can’t stand it. “You asked if I wanted to marry you.”

She nods, as if he’s vindicated her. “That’s right, I asked if you _wanted_ to marry me, not if you would.”

“Semantics.”

“No, it isn’t.”

They are at a standstill, staring at each other like immovable forces.

Finally, he sighs heavily and reaches to push her hair out of her face, just like she knew he would. “Does it _matter_?”

For a split-second he thinks she’s going to double down on her convictions. But then she smiles a bit sheepishly. “…Do _you_ want to do it?”

He traces a finger around her left breast and keeps his eyes focused there, perhaps avoiding her gaze but also because…well, it’s hard not to. “To do what? Propose to you?”

“Yes.” Now it’s her turn for the knowing smile.

“…Might do.” He leans forward and kisses the top of her breast. “When you least expect it.”

She’s thrilled by this idea. “Oh, I like that.”

“Not gettin’ down on one knee though,” he insists.

“Oh good god, please don’t,” she agrees, running her fingers through his hair and starting to massage his scalp while his head is bowed.

He takes her nipple into his mouth; she drops her head back and sighs contentedly. He reaches to knead her other breast while he sucks on her nipple and she feels him finally getting hard again between her legs. She lifts her head back up and smiles.

“Ah, there you are.”

He releases her breast from his mouth. “Thirty minutes not a bad turnaround time for age forty-seven,” he notes matter-of-factly and with great pride.

“Helps I’ve got you between my legs.” She leers at him.

“….A bit, yeah.” 

She goes for his lips again, kissing him then sucking on his bottom lip before moving to his cheek, then his jaw, then his neck. She presses her lips into his chest, then is moved to lay her head against him, her ear against his skin. She keeps the pacemaker scar, on the other side, in her sights, then covers it with her palm. He lays a hand at the small of her back, and with the fingers of the other traces her spine up and down in a continuous motion.

Her eyelids flutter a few times. “Sorry, love.” Her eyelids close. He kisses the top of her head. “Promised I’d shag you as many times as you’d like tonight.” He kisses her hairline. “I’ll shag you good and senseless in the morning.”

He would not deny his mild disappointment, especially given that he’s just gotten hard again, but he is also very content to have her laying on him this way, skin to skin, her legs still straddling his waist.

“I know you will,” he says softly, with a kiss to her forehead now. She is very good at keeping her word when it comes to morning sex.

He feels her yawn against his skin and stretches his arm out to switch off the bedside lamp. He smiles, thinking about how this is not the first time his heartbeat has lulled her to sleep.

“I love you,” she says in the exhale of her yawn.

“I love _you_,” he replies, sliding down the headboard and over his pillow until they’re horizontal and he’s flat on the mattress, her laying atop him.

In the morning, he awakes to find them both lying on their sides, his body curled around hers, limbs tangled. He snuggles into her and kisses her bare shoulder, up to her neck. He feels her legs stretch out and knows she’s awake now.

“Morning,” she says quietly, without turning to look at him. She’s squirming a bit in his arms, bringing her body back to life, but he doesn’t loosen his hold on her. He just keeps kissing her neck. “Had the oddest dream. We had the new forensic investigator and his wife over for dinner and I…snogged the wife? Then you and I both got each other off in the hallway, ate ice cream in bed, and somehow ended up engaged.”

He bites her shoulder, refusing to laugh. _She _laughs. “_Ow_, bastard.” She moves his hand from her stomach to her breast and can immediately feel him straining against his briefs. “You mean to tell me all of that actually happened?”

“Every bit,” he whispers into her ear before nipping at her earlobe.

He goes back to her neck, pushing her hair out of the way.

“Your sorry arse actually agreed to marry me?” Ellie asks, feigning shock.

“Might regret it later,” he murmurs, squeezing her breast.

“You bloody well might.”

They make love slowly, lying on their sides with him behind her. He manages to make her come twice, once a few minutes before he does, and then again nearly in time with him. They’re grateful for a quiet, empty house, to not have to police their volume or hold back. Her body feels like jelly afterwards and he holds her against him as if she’s going to disentegrate if he lets go. Once she’s recovered a bit, she turns in his arms to lie on her back and look up at him.

“Good for you?”

“Mm-hmm.” He kisses her lips. His fingers run back and forth across her stomach lightly.

“Dunno if that counts as shagging you senseless,” she remarks. “As I promised to do.”

“Later.” He kisses her again. “How long ‘til the kids are back?”

Ellie turns and looks over at the clock on her bedside table. “Two hours or so I’d guess. Dunno ‘bout Daiz.”

“I think she and Chloe going up to Bournemouth for the day with Beth? Did I make that up?”

“No, that sounds right.” She thinks about it. “…Think I was supposed to go with them, wasn’t I?”

“You’re not.” He kisses her cheek, then her temple. She smiles. “You’re mine this weekend. Kids or no kids.”

“I’ll text her.” She reaches for her mobile and begins typing a message. Alec kisses her arm as she does. “Maybe we can take the boys to the beach after football.”

“Mm-hmm.”

After texting Beth, she puts her mobile away again and turns into him. “When do you want to tell them?”

“…Seems like we’re always droppin’ bombs on them, doesn’t it.”

“Well, this is a good one.” She squeezes his hip and pulls him against her. “They’ll like this one.” 

“That or they won’t care a wit,” he replies. 

She laughs. “Yeah, they’re pretty over our shite at this point. Completely uninterested.” 

“When d’you want to do it?” 

“The thing itself?” Ellie’s eyes dart around, brain synapses firing. “…Well, don’t want to look all pregnant in the photos. So we either do it _right now_ or after the baby’s born. And I don’t know that it makes sense for us to do it so soon.”

He frowns, doing math in his head. “So…six months until the baby’s born, then you figure at least three months ‘til we’ve got our heads on straight, and then a month or so to plan a small do. That’s ten months from now.”

“Yes.” She seems perfectly content with this and tries to kiss him, but he turns his head, distracted. “Love, that’s not an abnormally long engagement. It’s fairly typical.”

“No interest in just…runnin’ over to the courthouse and makin’ quick work of it?” He asks hopefully. 

She shakes her head incredulously. “Alec, we’ve got _kids_. They have to be a part of it, they have to feel included in the whole thing. We can’t drag them down to the courthouse so they can sit on a bench and watch us fill out paperwork.” He sighs, dropping his head onto her shoulder. “Don’t need a _big_ do or any kind of elaborate ceremony. Something nice and small, like Maggie and Jocelyn’s. Just family, mates, and booze.”

“They’re all _your_ mates,” he complains.

“Whose fault is that? Maybe you ought to put yourself out there a little more,” Ellie suggests.

“You sound like Daiz tryin’ to get me on Tinder.”

Ellie laughs out loud at the memory. “God, that was bloody rich. I got mileage out of that one for weeks.” 

He scowls at her.

“What was her name?”

“Don’t remember,” he mumbles.

“Yes, you do!” He shakes his head. “Well, _I _do. _Zoe_.”

He turns and lies down on his back. She just turns to face him, propping her head up on her elbow and laying a hand on his ribcage.

“How do you know that?”

“I know everything.” She grins, eyes twinkling. She plants a kiss on his chest. “Don’t be embarrassed, love. Dating is hard.”

“Thank christ I never have to do it again.”

“Oh, the poor sexually frustrated Alec Hardy of yore,” Ellie sighs wistfully. “Chattin’ up Becca Fisher, goin’ on internet dates…”

He glares at her. “Don’t be cruel, Ellie.”

“I’m not! I mean, christ, I had a one night stand with a stranger, not much better.” She shakes her head and covers with her face with hands.

“Don’t love that you’d been with so many people in between Joe and me.” He looks up at the ceiling.

“Thought after last night we weren’t doing jealous anymore,” Ellie reminds him, poking his cheek.

“Not jealous,” he insists. “You were with three men since Joe and I was with…no one since Tess.”

“Doesn’t matter.” She kisses the side of his mouth. “You’ve more than made up for lost time with me.” She smoothes his hair back. “Anyway, the Becca thing is just funny, and the Tinder thing I find quite adorable.” 

He’s still pouting. “I wanted to be with _you_.”

“Well I know that _now_.” She pats his cheek then lays her head on his chest. “We were talking about the wedding.”

“_The wedding_,” he reiterates with mild disgust.

“Call it what you want then,” she replies, unoffended. “But I think it’s best if we wait ‘til _after_. Photos aside, I don’t want people thinking we’re getting married just because we’re pregnant.”

“…Fair point.” He tightens his arms around her. “Like to marry you right now, right here in this bed.”

“Be a bit awkward for the witnesses.” She yawns.

He lifts his head a little in an attempt to look down at her. “Is that gonna happen every time?”

“What.” She snuggles against him.

“You put your head on my chest and you doze right off,” he tells her.

“Mm. Cheaper than sleeping pills.” She plays with his chest hair absently. “The feel of your very _regular_ heartbeat relaxes me and I won’t apologize for it.”

“Okay.” He kisses her hair. 

“Back to sleep for a while, yeah?” From the sound of her voice she’s already half-asleep. “Sleeping for two, remember.”

But he doesn’t sleep. He holds her and stares at the ceiling, thinking about weddings. He sifts through memories of his first wedding, remembering how nervous he’d been, all from the moment he proposed. He’s not nervous now. At the time, he’d thought it was perfectly logical to be anxious, wedding jitters are so normal they have a name for it, so he had almost been _comforted_ by the anxiety, thinking _that’s what people do_. Now he wonders if that’s really what people do. Why bother to get married if you’re not positive it’s the right thing? It’s quite a lot of work to do in the face of any uncertainty at all.

Alec has no uncertainty now. His feelings on marriage itself remain a little nebulous, but his feelings about being married to Ellie are unquestionably clear. He’ll marry her now, today, in ten months, a decade from now. He’ll marry her every day.

Within two hours, they’re both up and dressed, in the kitchen making breakfast. Well, she’s only allowed to do the tea, he does the rest. He makes a little too much, not knowing exactly when the boys will be home, so they sit at the kitchen table and end up eating much more than they normally would. He sits with the paper and she reads the news on her iPad. They sit quietly this way for a while. She turns and props her feet in his lap and with one hand he rubs them as they continue their separate journeys through the day’s news, occasionally exchanging remarks back and forth about what flaming rubbish the whole world is. Nights without children are rare, but mornings even more so. 

Lucy shows up with Tom and Fred around 11am. By this time they’ve done the washing up, tidied the kitchen, and of course ended up snogging against the counter. But at least the counter is _clean_. Alec and Ellie can hear the commotion of their arrival from the kitchen and go to the front hallway to meet them. Tom comes traipsing through first. Ellie pulls him into a hug he is very much not interested in, kisses the top of his head, then lets him go up the stairs.

“Get your football things together, we’ll need to leave in about thirty minutes!” She calls after him.

Then Fred comes running at full speed, carrying his stuffed giraffe named Rhino, and crashes into Ellie’s legs, holding onto them for dear life. She laughs. “Happy to see you too, love.”

Lucy brings Fred’s bag to the door and hands it to Alec. “Been askin’ for you both nonstop.”

Fred lets her go and holds his arms up, like a baby who wants to be held. Ellie picks him up, straining a bit at first, now that he’s getting so big. Fred puts his arms around her and lies his head on her chest wordlessly. “Oh, what’s the trouble, my little love,” Ellie coos, kissing the side of his head and rocking him just a little.

Alec rubs his back, then looks at Lucy. “He say anythin’ in particular?”

Lucy shrugs. “Not a thing. He was no bother at all, seemed perfectly fine, just every once in awhile would ask for you.” She pats his back. “You’re all right, aren’t you, Freddie?”

Fred nods against Ellie’s chest. He'd been a smidge clingy this last week, this they knew, but this subdued little boy clinging to her is another story entirely. Ellie turns and walks them toward the living room. Alec stays in the doorway with Lucy.

“Doesn’t seem ill to you?” Alec asks.

“Checked his temperature several times and he seems fine otherwise,” Lucy confirms. She leans against the doorway. “Hear you two had quite the adventure last night.”

He sighs heavily, then guides Lucy back out into the driveway, closing the door behind them.

“Ooh, what’s this, goin’ to draw _me_ into your little harem now?”

Alec places his hands firmly on his hips, basically his default position in dealing with Lucy. “First off, it was Ellie and Ellie alone who snogged another woman last night, she is the only bloody woman in _my_ bloody harem, yeah?” 

Lucy purses her lips, utilizing every ounce of strength she has to keep from laughing at him.

“Second.” He sighs heavily again, avoiding her gaze. “I need your help.” 

Her face lights up. “Ooh, do tell. Unless it’s child-mindin’ again, in which case I’ve done my duty for at least a week.”

“You cannot say a _word_ about this to anyone, you cannot tell Ellie I’ve even told you, ‘cause she’ll want to do it herself, and when she does you are to act surprised, do you hear?” 

Lucy matches his position, hands on hips. “For someone who apparently needs a favor, you’re not very good at sweet-talkin’.”

“…Sorry.” He exhales. “Do you agree?”

“Yeah, fine, go on." 

He braces himself. “We’re gettin’ married, Ellie and me.” Lucy gasps. “Hang on, hang on, the thing is I need to propose properly. And to do that I need a ring.”

“Bloody hell, are you jokin’? After all that hogwash about _not _getting’ married, _never_ gettin’ married and a fie on anyone who suggests it?!” Lucy exclaims finally. “You two are fuckin’ unbelievable. _Also_, how in the name of christ our lord did you manage to have a little swingers party and come out of it _engaged_?! _And _–” 

Alec holds his hand up. “Keep your voice down, will you? I’ll let Ellie tell you about all that, all right? All I need is your help with the ring.”

Inside, Ellie is sitting on the couch with a very quiet Fred lying on her chest. She rubs his back and tries to encourage him to talk to her, but he mostly stays quiet.

“We can play Star Wars…” Ellie is saying as Alec walks in the room. “You can be Kylo, I bet Alec will be Han…”

Alec sits on the couch with them and rubs Fred’s back again. He and Ellie exchanged concerned glances. “Come on now, lad, let’s go and get our lightsabers, eh?”

Fred shakes his head.

“Sweet love, we can’t help you if you don’t tell us the matter,” Ellie says softly.

“Go on, then,” Alec says kindly.

Fred lifts his head tentatively, then sits up on Ellie’s lap. “Charlie’s mummy just had a baby and he says she doesn’t love him as much now ‘cause she had to give some to the new baby and she doesn’t read him books at bedtime anymore and only holds the baby.”

“Oh, sweetheart.” Ellie grabs both his hands and squeezes them. “I promise you Charlie’s mummy loves him just as much as she always did. Things just feel a bit different at home. That happens sometimes. Sometimes we have to make room for new things so that all the new things and the old things fit together. It might feel strange for a while, but it will work itself out.”

Fred is unmoved. He continues pouting and buries his face back in Ellie’s chest.

“It’ll not be so different as you think, lad,” Alec adds. “In fact, your mum and I will be around even more than we usually are, ‘cause we’ll need to be home with the baby. You’ll see us even more.”

Fred raises his head and looks at Alec skeptically. “But you’ll only pay attention to the _baby_.” 

“Nope, not true,” Alec insists. “There’s two of us. Me and your mum. Anytime the baby needs one of us, you’ll have the other.”

“That’s right,” Ellie says, stroking his hair. “And my love can only get bigger. Love can only expand, there’s no shrinking it. I’ll just have more and more every day.”

Fred considers this thoughtfully. “Like it'll grow when you’re sleeping? And you wake up with more love?”

Alec reaches to give Fred’s arm a squeeze, and kisses Ellie’s shoulder as he does.

“Always more love,” she assures him. “So much love I’ll only drive you mad with it!” She tickles Fred and he screeches, writhing around on her lap until he slides off onto the couch.

Alec stands up, knowing he’ll need to go light a fire under Tom to get ready, but watches them for a moment.

He could marry her right this second.

*


	2. Chapter 2

Popping in and out of jewelry shops with Lucy is not Alec’s idea of a perfect Sunday afternoon. He would have to note this in his vows, he thinks, as a testament to his love for Ellie.

Lucy is impossibly chatty, even more so than her younger sister, far more so in fact, and truly has something to say about everything. And somehow it’s all smarmy and cynical. (This, of course, he can understand.) Her favorite part about jewelry shopping is that the salespeople offer her a glass of champagne at every one. She always accepts. Alec always declines.

“Do you remember what her, um…her old ring looked like?” Alec questions, looking through a glass case. “Don’t want to get her anything similar.”

“Hmm.” Lucy leans against the counter, holding up her champagne flute elegantly. “Small, a single stone, I remember – god, they were broke when they married – thin gold band.”

Alec nods and his eyes draw themselves to the ones with _white _gold bands. “How many diamonds is too many diamonds?”

Lucy raises an eyebrow. “How many diamonds can you _afford_?”

“Doesn’t have to just be diamonds, right? This one has diamonds and…what are these, emeralds?”

“Yeah, emeralds,” Lucy answers, inspecting it. “Green _is _one of her best colors.”

“Aside from orange.” Alec snorts. Lucy does too. They share a very brief smile.

Alec taps on the glass and asks the salesperson to pull it out for him. He and Lucy inspect it carefully.

“That’s a good option, yeah?” Lucy nods, then Alec turns to the salesperson. “Can you set it aside for now?”

They keep browsing.

“Don’t want anything too gaudy,” Alec says. “She’ll hate that.” 

“Well, no, not _too _gaudy, but this _is _her second marriage and you’re not broke twentysomethings so you’ll have to meet a certain standard,” Lucy explains. “She’s forty-three years old, she needs something elegant and stylish, not too flashy but impressive. Eye-catching but not distracting. You want her to be _very_ upset if she ever drops it down the drain.” 

Alec is grimacing. “…No pressure.”

At the next shop, Lucy rejects Alec’s top three choices, all while throwing back a glass of champagne. As he debates between two others, Lucy studies him.

“Where does El think you are right now?”

“Shoe-shopping,” he grunts. “She thinks I need a new pair of loafers.”

Lucy snorts. “She would.”

“Remind me to stop and actually pick some up on the way home,” Alec says. 

“You two gonna live in that house forever?”

“Didn’t bring you with me for an interrogation.” He turns away from her, going to the next glass case over.

“Unspoken part of the deal,” she replies coolly. “She gonna take your name?”

“Lucy, we’ve only just made the decision to get married thirty-six hours ago.”

“Have you thought about how you’re gonna do it?” She questions. “The proposal.”

“Thought I’d let it be a surprise to me as well. Just…do it the moment I’m moved to do it,” Alec says tentatively, quickly sensing her displeasure.

“What, just carry the ring around with you at all times?” She rolls her eyes. “Don’t be daft. Anyway I know you two, you’ll be suddenly moved to do it while you’re doin’ something boring like watching _Bake Off _and you’ll end up with a terrible story to tell your child. ‘Oh, Daddy asked Mummy to marry him while the bakers did their technical challenge.’ How bloody romantic.”

Alec sighs heavily. “Want it to feel genuine and spontaneous. Not like an obligation.”

“Proposals aren’t _supposed _to be genuine and spontaneous, you stupid sod,” Lucy remarks critically. “Almost by definition they are to be meticulously _planned_.”

Alec rubs the back of his neck, suddenly feeling distressed.

Lucy smiles. “But don’t you worry. I’ve an idea.”

*

That evening, as a treat to themselves, Alec and Ellie pop in a dvd of the first series of _Prime Suspect_. They’ve already watched the entire series together once, at the beginning of their courtship (such as it was), but it’s been nearly seven months so they feel they earned another go round. The kids have all retired to their respective rooms, though it took nearly an hour to get Fred down. Ellie lies on the couch with her feet in Alec’s lap. He rubs them dutifully. Oddly he takes great pleasure in it. With alcohol off the table, it’s about the only thing he can do to relax her apart from sex. And turns out, he’s good at it. Except for sometimes he hits that one spot that makes her giggle involuntarily. (Maybe on purpose.)

He’s paying close attention to the telly when he hears her groan, “_God_.” He looks over and she’s got her eyes closed and smile on her face. “Why are you so bloody good at that.” She sighs with pleasure. 

“Don’t make sounds like that, you’ll turn me on,” Alec complains. 

“Sorry,” she replies sheepishly, fluttering her eyelids at him. 

He smiles and turns back to the telly. He starts on her other foot.

“My god, isn’t she just stunning?” Ellie says, focused on the screen. “Would you shag her?”

“Wha, Helen Mirren?”

“Yeah.”

“Would you?”

She laughs. “Dunno, maybe if she insisted. Don’t think I could cross her.”

“Probably would too,” Alec agrees.

He looks over and she’s grinning at him. She has a perverse love for anytime he reluctantly admits being attracted to a celebrity. To wipe the smile off her face, he pushes his thumb into the arch of her foot and she drops her head back with a luxurious sigh that is too loud.

He’d give anything to propose right now.

* 

A few hours later, he’s in bed reading one of his Le Carre novels when she emerges from the master bathroom in a towel fresh from her shower. Keeping his nose in the book but his eyes trained over the top, he watches her brush her damp hair, then sit on the end of the bed and moisturize her legs and arms. She is humming an unrecognizable tune absently to herself. She pulls out a t-shirt and pyjama bottoms, then drops her towel. She pulls on both items of clothing and only then does she notice him observing her with rapt attention.

“Oi!” She protests, but she’s smiling. “_Cheeky_.”

He feels the urge to dig out the ring then and there.

* 

In the morning, he comes downstairs to find her plaiting Daisy’s hair at the breakfast table. Tom is making toast for everyone, standing at the counter by the toaster. Fred is chattering almost unintelligibly about _Star Wars_, as per usual. Daisy and Ellie seem to be sharing some kind of private joke. 

He feels for the ring in his pocket.

*

Around midday, she appears in the doorway of his office with a wicked grin on her face. He looks up.

“Want to hear a joke?”

He frowns then smiles in quick succession, leaning back in his chair expectantly.

“There’s two fish in a tank, and one them says, ‘how do you drive this thing’?”

She waits a beat, then bursts out laughing uncontrollably. He blinks back at her.

“Hilarious,” she says to herself, still in stitches as she walks back out the door again.

Yeah. He could propose right now.

*

“Are you bloody _blind_?”

She’s shouting at him in the bullpen. Everyone around them tries very hard to keep their heads down all the while listening intently, of course.

“Any sodding idiot can _see_.” She’s shoving crime scene photographs in his face.

“It’s not the same woman,” he insists, hands on his hips like he means business.

“Of course it is!” She points at the CCTV paused on her computer. “She’s got the same nose, same chin, same bloody cup size!”

“She’s about two inches shorter than the woman lyin’ in the morgue!” He shouts back.

“How on earth can you tell?!”

“Because I’m a sodding _detective_!”

Her jaw drops in offense and she storms off toward the ladies’. “Such a bloody knob end!"

He has half a mind to be on one knee by the time she comes back.

* 

Around 4pm, after about fifteen minutes of searching for her, he finds her standing outside behind the station, leaning against the wall, biting into a giant scotch egg. He clears his throat, announcing his presence.

With a mouthful, she says, “Sorry.”

He could drag her to the courthouse that very minute.

* 

After work, they pick up the kids and take them to the arcade on the boardwalk. Ellie beats him at every game until he can’t take it anymore. He grabs her hand and drags her outside onto the boardwalk

“What?” She pushes her own hair out of her eyes.

He pushes her against the wall. “Got to give me a chance to win _somethin’_.” He kisses her, hard and long, until her knees give out underneath her and he has to hold her upright.

“All right,” she says breathlessly. “You win.”

The only words that come to his mind in the moment are _Marry Me. _

*

Later, he’s in the kitchen fixing dinner, catching up with Daisy and Tom as they both do their schoolwork at the table. With ten minutes to go, Alec goes to give Ellie and Fred a warning, wherever they are. They are uncharacteristically quiet.

He finds them in the living room. She’s laying on the floor holding her t-shirt up while Fred draws on her bare stomach with washable markers. She giggles intermittently from ticklishness.

“What in god’s name…” Alec trails off, shaking his head.

Both Ellie and Fred look at him with big ole grins on their faces.

“I’m drawing the baby!” Fred exclaims.

Ellie makes a goofy face at him and lies back down again.

He starts thinking of ways he can get moments like this into their vows.

*

After he puts Fred to bed, he follows the faint tones of Fleetwood Mac up to their bedroom and finds her in the master bathroom, comfortably soaking in the bathtub. Her eyes are closed as she faintly sings along to “Silver Springs.” The water has turned a slightly bizarre color, a sign that the washable marker on her stomach has indeed started to wash off.

“Not a bad life, eh?” He says, startling her from her reverie.

She turns her head and smiles at him. “No, not bad.”

He turns the speakers down a bit and steps further into the room.

“Fred go down okay?”

“Much easier than last night,” he replies, leaning against the sink.

“Lucky.” She looks him up and down appreciatively. “You gonna get in here with me or what?”

“Tempting.”

“Go on, strip down for me, Detective Inspector.” She wiggles her eyebrows at him.

He looks over his shoulder furtively. “Dunno, El. It’s early yet, Daiz and Tom are still up,” he counters.

She raises one shapely leg out of the soapy water and rests her foot on the edge of the tub. “Just close the bloody door, they’ll call out if the house is on fire I promise you.”

Just her dripping wet leg is enough to make him give into temptation. His tie has been pulled off long ago, now he works on unbuttoning his shirt, keeping his eyes on her all the while. He shrugs it off, then unbuckles his belt and pulls down his trousers. She’s biting her thumb watching him. He pulls off his briefs, and she sits up, pulling herself forward to give him room to get in behind her. He steps into the water and lowers himself down with a sigh, leaning against the back of the tub. Water sloshes over the side f the tub, causing her to shriek with laughter. Once it settles, Ellie slides back a bit, between his legs, and lies back against his chest. He kisses her ear and settles one hand at her breast, which he strokes with his thumb, and the other flat on her stomach.

She closes her eyes and exhales. “Have you ever been so relaxed in your life?"

_Not without medication_, he thinks. He closes his eyes too and soon he’s breathing in time with her.

Then there’s a knock on the door. “Mum! The handle on my closet door’s come off!” Tom shouts.

“In the bath!” Ellie calls back, without qualm, without even opening her eyes.

“Well, where’s Alec then?”

Alec’s body tenses up. “…In here, lad.”

“Oh, _bollocks_,” they can hear Tom mutter with complete and total disgust.

He can feel Ellie’s body shudder a bit with silent laughter.

“You two are sick,” Tom complains.

“Oh, come off it, we’re not bloody doing anything!” Ellie calls back to him. “You know where the tools are, fix your own sodding doorknob!”

They hear Tom’s footsteps padding in the opposite direction.

If there was a diamond ring floating somewhere in the water, he’d put it on her finger now.

*

A few hours after their relatively chaste soak in the bath, he fucks her hard on top of all the covers on the bed. He grips her thighs so tightly he can almost feel the bruises forming on her flesh and he slams into her at her own request, or demand rather, until she pulls a pillow over her face and cries out into it. He finishes halfway through her orgasm, likely because of it, and to keep quiet he bites into his own lip so hard he draws blood.

“_Fuck_.” He collapses on top of her, panting.

She runs her fingers through his sweaty hair once then he rolls off her and they both stare at the ceiling.

“Honestly, I just think it’s unfair for the sex to be this good,” she says suddenly, without looking at him. “Two middle-aged, small town detectives with three and a half kids. You’ve no right to fuck me like that.”

He turn his head to look at her. Then she turns to look at him, smirking. He starts laughing heartily. 

He so badly wants to do it now.

But tomorrow. He’ll do it tomorrow.

**


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The responses to the last chapter made my day, truly. Thank you! Amazed and grateful that so many of you have stuck with this. This little universe makes me so happy, and is a magical distraction from my professional writing life, where deadlines loom and anxiety abounds. 
> 
> Xx
> 
> (slight tw for anyone who doesn't want to think about Joe - you might want to skip past the first asterisk.)

Joe Miller proposed to Ellie Barrett on the beach at sunrise. He had tried for sun_set_, but he couldn’t drag her out of the pub in time. He had planned a romantic evening for two of them, which was upset when an old friend from the neighborhood had unexpectedly come home to Broadchurch to visit. Scrapping their plans, Ellie had dragged Joe to dinner at Nando’s with all of her high school friends and then to the pub. He very dutifully played the role of dedicated and loving boyfriend, all the while the engagement ring he’d spent half a year saving up for was burning a hole in his pocket. She’d gotten properly smashed and he nursed a single pint all evening, even once it was warm, so that he could look after her. He allowed himself a bit of fun despite his distress, mostly because _she_ was having so much fun and he could never resist her. They danced to the jukebox, to songs that were inside jokes for her and her mates, and played drinking games. He often kept a possessive arm around her shoulders. Still being something of an outsider in Broadchurch, he was never quite convinced that her friends believed he was here to stay. Word around town, apparently, was that Ellie Barrett was still fair play even though she and Joe had been seeing other steadily for nine months. He knew they were just protective of the girl they’d grown up with, the girl they’d known their entire lives. Possibly worried that he’d snatch her up and drag her back to Wales with him. But it drove Joe a bit crackers.

Around two in the morning, they called it a night, the group of friends parting in various directions down the high street. Joe took Ellie’s hand to steady her as they walked back to his flat, which was closest. As often she did while under the influence, Ellie got quite frisky and he’d somehow managed to manoeuver the ring out of his trouser pockets before she yanked them off him. She’d barely managed to stay awake as he shagged her on his couch, though to be fair he was so distracted that he wasn’t exactly putting his back into it, as they say. Afterwards, he forced her to drink two whole glasses of water and down three aspirins, then moved her to his bed and tucked her in.

Joe himself did not sleep. He paced the flat trying to determine a plan b. When he finally landed on sunrise at the beach, he crawled on top of the bed beside her and watched her sleep until he caught the barest glimpse of daybreak. He then woke her up gently, knowing well what a hungover Ellie Barrett could be like, helped her get dressed again, and placed a warm mug of tea in her hands. She hardly had the wherewithal to protest, still half-asleep and to be honest fairly tickled by the clandestine nature of the whole affair. He guided her by the hand down the beach and they made it to the shoreline just in time to see the full sunrise in all its glory. He watched her watch the colors change, watched her slowly come back to life.

Then he took her hand and got down on one knee. Something about her being the love of his life, something about the way she colored his world, something about how he never wanted to wake up without her next to him.

She said yes. She cried. He cried. She dropped to her knees to kiss him and they snogged on the beach until they could feel the eyes of eager tourists and early morning joggers on them. They were twenty-six years old and in love.

*

Alec keeps the ring in a locked drawer in his desk all day. Every once in a while, he unlocks it to check and make sure it’s still there.

Sometime around late afternoon he finds himself on the phone with Lucy.

His side of the conversation sounds something like this:

“Uh. Right. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Right, yeah. Are you – fine, okay. And then --- yeah. All right. Good. Good, then. Okay.”

Ellie has appeared in his office doorway sometime during this.

“Who was that?”

He nearly drops his mobile but he saves it with his other hand. “Uh, Jenkinson. Paperwork error.”

She eyes him suspiciously, then collapses onto his couch. “You’ve no idea how painful it is to walk right now,” she complains. “You should see the bruises on my thighs.”

He sits on the edge of his desk facing her and winces. “Sorry.”

“Saying sorry implies you won’t do it again and I can’t have_ that_.”

He holds his hands up. “I rescind my apology then.”

She props her feet up on the coffee table. “You remember I’m going out with Luce tonight, yeah?”

He nods. “Yeah. I’ll probably need to stay late to fix the, uh, paperwork error but Daiz will look after Tom and Fred ‘til I get home.”

“And you’ll find a way to occupy yourself?”

“Maybe the kids will indulge me and we’ll watch a film,” he replies. “Else I might wither away in your absence.” 

She stands and goes to him. “All right.” She gives him a kiss. “I’m off home to change. I’ll see you later on.”

He gives _her_ a kiss. “Have fun. Don’t do anythin’ I wouldn’t do.”

She laughs as she walks out the door. “What would that leave me with?!”

*

Lucy picks her up at home about an hour later. Ellie wears a form-fitting grey cotton knee-length dress that still manages to hug her in all the right places despite her gradually changing body. Her pregnancy is not yet visible to the untrained eye, but in this dress even the trained eye would struggle to notice it. She’s taken out the pins and actually done something with her hair, letting it fall in a long bob just past her chin. She puts on a bit more makeup and applies a flashier lipstick than she wore to work. Going out with Lucy somehow always turns into a competition, one that is a lot less fun when she isn’t allowed to drink.

Lucy takes her to the pub and she could _kill _her sister.

“You do realize I can’t bloody drink!” Ellie exclaims, reluctantly taking a seat on the bar stool next to her. Now she’ll have to make an awkward excuse to Sam the bartender why she isn’t drinking.

“Well, where else were we gonna go?” Lucy retorts.

“I dunno, could have gone to _dinner_ maybe,” Ellie replies. “At a _restaurant_. With _food_.” 

Lucy orders herself a cocktail, then says, “Don’t get your knickers in a twist, El. We’ll just have one drink.”

“Club soda for me,” Ellie tells Sam, with a heavy sigh. He raises an eyebrow at her but the look on her face tells him not to ask questions.

*

Alec sits on their bench by the pier. He has changed from his work suit into, well, another suit. He compulsively checks his pocket to make sure the ring box is there. He is not nervous. He’s simply _ready_.

To his astonishment, he catches a glimpse of them right on time. A miracle, as he’s never known Lucy to be on time for anything. Walking alongside her is Ellie wearing that grey dress he loves, wobbling a bit in her high-heeled shoes. She squints when she sees him in the distance. He stands and faces them as they get closer.

“What on earth are _you _doin’ out here?” She calls out.

He waits until she’s just a few feet away. “Waitin’ for _you_.” 

Ellie doesn’t notice Lucy stop walking, planting herself nearby. She looks back. “What are you – “ She looks back at Alec, pushing her hair out of her face as the wind gently whips it around a bit. “Is that a different suit than you had on two hours ago?” 

He shrugs. “It’s my nice suit.”

She scoffs. “It’s just your more expensive work suit.” 

Alec holds a hand out of her, which she suspiciously accepts. “Who’s with the kids?”

He tilts his head to the right and she turns to follow his gaze. Beautifully, incredibly on time as well, her father is walking toward them with all three kids. Fred starts to run toward them, but David stops him with a hand on his shoulder. They can’t hear the ensuing exchange. All three of them look wildly confused and not just a little put out by the whole thing. They stop next to Lucy and plant themselves there.

Her eyebrows furrowed in confusion, she turns back to Alec. “You wanna tell me whatever it is I seem to be the last to know about?!”

“Do you one better, lass,” he says, reaching into his pocket. “I’ll _show_ you.”

He pulls out the ring box. Daisy squeals and starts jumping up and down. Ellie’s jaw drops.

“Time to do this properly,” Alec tells her, popping the ring box open.

The ring has a white gold band. In the middle there is a modest but respectable sized diamond, and on each side there are two small birthstones, four in total. One for Daisy, Tom, Fred, and the baby. He holds the ring box out with one hand and is still holding her hand in his other.

She raises her free hand to cover her mouth.

Alec takes a breath. He doesn’t get down on one knee. Neither one of them could stand it if he did.

“Eleanor Jane Miller.” Her eyes widen. “Yeah, didn’t think I knew that, did you?” She smiles and shakes her head. “There’s not much I can say to you that you don’t already know, and words aren’t anywhere near my, uh.” She laughs. “Strong suit. So I’ll be brief. This bench is no longer about endings for us.” They both turn to look at it for a split second before looking back at each other. “It’s about beginnings. We’re reclaimin’ the bench, Miller.” She squeezes his hand and he smiles. “And on that note, I am good and tired of callin’ ya _Miller_. I think it’s time we introduced people to Ellie H --- “

She throws her arms around his neck and kisses him. “Sorry,” she says, blushing as their lips separate. She pulls back a bit. “I’ll let you finish.”

He grins. “Askin’ the question is a bloody good lot easier when you already know the answer.”

“DO IT!” Daisy shouts.

Alec carefully takes the ring out of the box. Lucy runs up and takes the box, then runs back to where she was. He holds up the ring. 

“Ellie, will you – “

“_Yes_.” Her hand flies up to her mouth. “Sorry.”

“Oh for god’s sakes, just _marry me_, will you?!” He exclaims.

It’s unclear who kisses who this time, it’s frantic and desperate and joyous. He nearly drops the ring. “Yes,” she whispers against his lips. 

He pulls back, takes her left hand, and slips the ring onto her finger.

Their small audience starts hooting and hollering, even Tom.

Ellie looks down at the ring with astonishment for a moment before he pulls her against him once more.

“You are magic,” he whispers in her ear. 

She buries her face in his neck and holds onto her tightly.

“I can’t believe you bloody did all this.” She kisses his cheek, then his lips again. Then she whacks his arm. “You wanker.”

Fred is squirming like crazy, bouncing on his tiptoes. Finally David leans down to him and says, “Go get ‘em, mate,” and lets go of the boy’s hand.

Fred comes running at them at full speeed and crashes into their legs. Ellie and Alec separate just enough so that Alec can pick him up.

“Are you getting married??” Fred asks, having been confused for almost this entire event. 

“Only if you’re free that day,” Alec replies, holding Fred on his hip.

“Yes, little love,” Ellie says with a laugh, kissing the boy’s cheek. “Is that all right with you?”

Fred holds his arms out until Ellie pulls him over into hers. Then Daisy comes up and hugs her father from behind.

“Will there be cake?” Fred asks.

“_So _much cake,” Ellie confirms.

“Proud of you, Dad,” Daisy says into her father’s jacket.

Alec turns to look at his daughter in awe. David, Lucy, and Tom surround them now. Hugs and kisses of congratulations are offered and accepted. Fred wriggles out of Ellie’s arms and starts running around them all excitedly. 

Ellie puts an arm around her older son’s shoulders. “All right, lovely?”

“Yeah.” He nods, and then even smiles at her. “I think this is good, I think this will be good.”

She kisses the side of his head and he winces but doesn’t pull away.

“One last thing!” Lucy calls out. They all turn their attention to her. She throws a key in Alec’s direction. He catches it just barely. “Room number twelve at the Trader’s is all yours tonight. Gift from me and Dad.”

“We’re sleeping in a hotel tonight?!” Fred exclaims.

Lucy scoops him up. “Not _you_, you little monkey!”

A bit overcome, Ellie embraces her father. “Thanks, Dad.”

He pats her cheek. “I’ll stay with the young ones overnight and get ‘em off to school in the morning.”

Alec has started to feel like he’s watching the entire scene from somewhere above it. Ellie kissing her father’s cheek, Daisy playfully punching Tom’s arm, Fred running circles around Lucy. He thinks back to years earlier, cornering Ellie in the ladies’ room at the courthouse, her saying, in tears, “How is this my life now?” 

_This _is her life now. His breath catches a little in his throat as he exhales. He’s so caught up watching them – now Tom fending off a hug from Fred, Ellie whispering animatedly to her sister, David with a hand on Daisy’s shoulder – that he’s nearly forgotten where he is.

He feels Ellie’s hand in his and slides back into reality. She’s all lit up from the inside.

“Bit much, eh?” She squeezes his hand. He smiles when he feels the ring on her finger.

“Just you now,” he requests, leaning down to kiss her temple. “Please.”

“I’m on it.”

She pulls her hand away and returns to the crowd. She seems to only share a single look with Lucy and suddenly Lucy is gathering up the children.

“All right, let’s get off then,” Lucy says. “Say goodnight to your mushy lovesick parents.”

They say their goodbyes, thank yous, and congratulations. Fred is the hardest to shake. He keeps trying to climb Ellie like a tree. David peels him off of her and puts him on his shoulders, a bit painstakingly. He’s getting on, after all.

As they start to disappear from view, Alec guides Ellie back to the bench. They sit side by side. She pulls his hand into her lap and lays her head on his shoulder.

“Didn’t think you’d actually do it,” she says, after a moment. 

“What, propose?” He tries to look down at her. He can’t _believe _she didn’t know. “Ellie, I’ve been dyin’ to propose to you for…” His head is swimming as the moments come flooding back. “Too long. I almost proposed to you twelve different times yesterday alone. It was agony.” 

She laughs with surprise. “I was so bloody boring yesterday!”

“No.” He shakes his head. “You weren’t.”

She kisses his cheek, then holds out her left hand, flexing her ring finger. “Tell me about this.”

“Well.” He reaches out to the steady the hand as he points out each stone. “White gold, because mere gold wouldn’t do.” He refuses to say _because the ring Joe gave you was gold_. “Diamond. For…whatever diamonds symbolize. And these…” He touches each of the four small birthstones. “Each of the kids’ birthstones.”

She turns to him with a look of pure astonishment painted on her face. “_No_.”

He nods, quite pleased with himself in fact.

“You’re unbelievable.”

He might be offended by how astonished she is, but then he realizes she’s probably right to be. “Lucy helped,” he admits. “But the birthstones were all me.”

“Can’t believe you braved an outing with Luce for me.”

“Quite right,” he replies. “Never doubt the size of my love for you.”

She observes the ring from different angles, watching the gems glisten in the moonlight. “It’s so beautiful.”

He feels her shiver in the wind and takes his jacket off. She looks over at him with wide eyes. “Don’t you dare, it’s too much.”

He does it anyway. He places his jacket over her shoulders.

She shakes her head dubiously, but she’s smiling. “Oh, I could _kill _you for being so romantic, how _dare _you.” She takes his face in her hands and kisses him, deepening the kiss almost immediately. He slides his tongue into her mouth as his hand finds her breast and she has half a mind to crawl right onto his lap.

From somewhere down the boardwalk, they hear a few teenagers whistle at them.

“God’s sake,” Alec mutters.

Ellie reaches into his trouser pocket and he groans. She pulls out a key. “Shall we?”

**


	4. Chapter 4

They walk into the Trader’s Hotel hand in hand, his jacket still over her shoulders. Ellie’s eyes are wide and glassy and she can’t keep her eyes off him. She feels like a proper teenager.

Becca Fisher sits at the front desk and nearly jumps when she sees them both.

“Alec. Ellie.”

Alec groans in annoyance at her calling him Alec. Ellie _might_ want to throttle her.

“I thought – when Lucy came by, I just assumed…the room was just for Ellie,” Becca stammers.

Ellie raises an eyebrow at her. “You just assumed that we’d split up and he’d kicked me out?”

Becca doesn’t reply. Her gaze falls down to the ring on Ellie’s finger. Ellie is acutely aware of this, and holds up her left hand. She holds her head up high. “Guess you’re the first to know.”

She pulls Alec down the hall and up the stairs, in the wake of Becca’s shock. Once they’re safely up the stairs, Alec slips his arms around her waist from behind and pulls her against him.

“You’re awful,” he tells her, biting into the muscle between her neck and shoulder.

Ellie gasps. He soothes the bitemark with his tongue and then begins sucking on the skin there. Someone comes out of the room next to them and they straighten up and smile politely until they pass. Then Alec spins her around in his arms to face him. His jacket falls off her shoulders but they don’t notice. He kisses her hard and starts walking them down the hall, pushing her backward, looking for room number twelve. After several steps, he glimpses number twelve out of the corner of his eye and slams her against the door.

“Sorry,” he mumbles, fishing for the key.

“Do it again,” she demands. “On the inside.”

“You have it,” he says, lips smushed against hers, when he remembers her taking the key from him.

She fishes through her purse frantically, not easy to do with his body pinning hers to the door and his tongue in her mouth. She finds it and hands it to him. He nearly drops it as he turns it in the keyhole and turns the knob. That done, he throws the key inside the room then lifts Ellie up by the thighs – still bruised from the night before, causing her to gasp out an “oh, _fuck_” – and pushes her into the room.

“Sorry,” he says again. He kicks the door shut behind them.

“Don’t say sorry,” she says breathlessly, just as he slams her against the inside of the door, as requested.

He moves his hands under her dress to her arse, considerably less bruised, and holds her up with the help of the door behind her, kissing her until neither one of them can breathe.

“_Alec_,” she manages to say with a slightly warning tone. He pulls his head back, their lips separate, and he just holds her there, both of them catching their breath with some difficulty. 

He touches his head to her chest, both still breathing heavily. “You’ll be all banged up and bruised.” 

“Fine by me.” She locks her ankles together at the small of his back and he grinds against her.

The _second_ they’ve caught their breath, their lips attack each other again, like they’re trying to devour each other whole. He brings one hand to her breast, cupping it through her dress, and presses her so hard against the door she thinks there might be an Ellie-shaped hole there in a minute. She reaches between them to pull off his belt, whipping it off him in record time. They’ve both gotten very, very good at undressing each other with great speed and efficiency. His lips move to her neck as he massages her breast, thumb flicking over her nipple. She pulls down his zipper and lets his trousers fall to the floor.

From behind, he tugs at her knickers, and she’s just about to unhook her ankles and stand up to pull them off when she hears the fabric rip. Her eyes widen, he raises his head from her neck and his eyes are wide too. He lifts up his hand and they see her ripped knickers in his fist. Her mouth opens, _thoroughly _impressed. From the look on his face it’s clear he had not intended this.

_“Alec Hardy_,” she exclaims, unable to conceal the thrill she feels. 

He looks at her a bit sheepishly. “Sorry.”

“Oh, god’s sake, stop apologizing and fuck me,” she demands.

He pulls his briefs down. “At your service.” He guides himself inside her slowly and then with a thrust. “_Mrs. Hardy_.”

“Oh god yes,” she gasps out, gripping his shoulders tightly as he thrusts into her a little faster now. “_Fuck_.”

He buries his face in her breasts, wishing to god he’d had the good sense to take her dress off her first. This lack of skin to skin contact is driving him mad. Her nails dig into his shoulder but he can still feel the glorious sting of them through his shirt, encouraging him to move faster and harder.

He lifts his head to kiss her bruised lips. He’s already close. “I love you,” he pants breathlessly against her lips.

“I love you,” she answers before pulling at his bottom lip with her teeth.

She loves this, she loves that they can be rough and reckless with each other and still say _I love you_ and mean it just as wholly and tenderly as they do when they take it slow.

He looks her in the eyes. “Do you need – “ It feels like she’s getting close too, but he doesn’t know if she needs an extra hand, so to speak. She shakes her head.

He kisses her as he comes, moaning into her mouth with pleasure. She comes a few seconds later, crying out his name. _Loudly_.

At first he thinks her exaggerated volume might be due to the lack of children on the premises. Then he realizes it’s for Becca’s benefit.

He quiets her by covering hers lips with his, gradually slowing his thrusts. “You really are awful,” he says with a smirk.

“_Oh_,” she lets out one last sigh of pleasure, and then matches his smirk with her own. “I want that cow to know _exactly _what she’s missing.” 

He gently pulls out of her. She unhooks her ankles and brings her feet to the floor. Her knees are wobbly and he holds her against the door for another moment. “God, I love you,” he says. 

“Do you love me enough to order me room service?” She asks coyly. “Lucy took me to the god forsaken _pub_ and I haven’t eaten a thing all night.”

He kisses her once, then takes a step back from her. She takes a deep breath and recalibrates, realizing she’d been squished for god knows how long. He smiles. “What would you like?” 

“Order me one of everything I like,” she says, limping off to the loo. “Just need to refresh myself. And wee like the bloody dickens.” 

*

Five minutes later, she emerges from the loo having smoothed out her hair, reapplied her lipstick, and likely other things no one can see. He’s lying on the bed in his briefs and his dress shirt. She looks around at the room, truly seeing it for the first time. It’s nothing special, par for the course for the Trader’s, but it does have a queen size bed, a mini bar, and a large flatscreen tv.

“Why on earth’d you put on lipstick when you know I’m just gonna kiss it off ya in a matter of minutes?” He asks with total bewilderment.

She walks over to the bed. “Because that’s what women _do_.”

Ellie sits on the side of the mattress then swings her legs over so she’s lying next to him, both propped up against the headboard.

“It’s infuriating,” he remarks, drawing her chin toward him and kissing her.

She smiles and wipes the lipstick off his lips with her thumb. “What did you order?”

“Far, far too much for two people.” He sighs, tossing the menu over onto the nightstand.

“Three people,” she reminds him.

“That’s right.” He turns onto his side and places a hand on her stomach. Smoothing his hand over the dress, her small baby bump is visible.

She watches him stare at it, rub his hand over it, and her whole body feels warm with love for him.

“Size of a strawberry,” he says, as if she doesn’t know, and she thinks her heart might explode. But instead she just nods, smiling at him though he’s not looking at her. Not at her face, anyway.

He lays his head on her chest, keeping his hand on her stomach, and she absently runs her fingers through his hair. They stay like this for some time.

Then he sits up a bit and brings his hand to one of her breasts, rubbing it gently and caressing it with his fingertips. He kisses her jaw.

“Room service will be here soon,” she protests quietly, lulled by his touch.

“I know,” he replies nonchalantly. “Can’t help myself.”

He appears content to keep doing what he’s doing, with no expectations of it going any further than this for now. But this very fact unfortunately just makes her want him more.

“Oh for heaven’s sake.” She quickly crawls over him, straddling him, and hikes up her dress. “S’pose a bit of snogging won’t hurt anyone.” 

And for the next fifteen minutes, this is exactly what they do. They make out like teenagers until their lips hurt and then make out some more. Until there’s a knock on the door. 

She climbs off of him. “You’d better,” he says, as he’s only wearing his shirt and briefs.

“Right.”

He runs into the loo to hide. She does not even bother to straighten herself out. She goes right to the door and flings it open. There Becca stands with a heavy tray of food.

“Oh, _Becca_, so kind,” Ellie says, stepping back to allow her inside. “I hope we didn’t disturb you earlier. Reckon we got a bit _carried away_.”

Becca steps inside and puts the tray down on the table. Then clocks the smeared lipstick on Ellie’s face. Which pleases Ellie immensely. “No, you’re fine,” Becca says politely. “Hope everything is to your liking.”

Ellie raises a suggestive eyebrow. “Oh you’ve no idea.” She pulls her hiked up dress down. “Oops.”

“Right, well.” Becca nods to herself and looks away. “Have a nice evening, Ellie.” 

“_Ta_.”

Ellie slams the door shut. When she turns around, Alec is standing the loo doorway shaking his head at her.

“_Terrible_,” he chides her.

Ellie shrugs. “Slag boffed my best friend’s husband, she has every bit of my ire coming to her.” She goes over to the food and uncovers every platter. All her favorites. “Oh, I _love_ you.”

“Quite like vicious Ellie,” Alec remarks, joining her by the table. “Though I’m a bit terrified of her, she’s wickedly sexy.”

She pops a chip in her mouth. “Bloody well right.” Ellie takes the plate of chips and crawls onto the bed with it. “I’m eating in bed and there’s not one thing you can do about it.”

Alec snorts. He gave up that fight a _long_ time ago. He picks up his salad, puts a smidge of dressing on it so she doesn’t yell at him, and gets onto the bed with her.

“I’ve ruined you,” she says, crinkling up her nose at him. He leans over and kisses it. “So many poor habits I’ve thrust upon you.”

“But my sex life has never been better.”

She guffaws and has to cover her mouth.

“It’s a trade off, you see,” he adds, laughing now too.

“You put up with me for the sex then.” She pops another chip into her mouth.

“Got it in one,” he says with a nod, trying his hardest not to smile. 

“Good a reason as any to marry a person, I s’pose,” she replies contentedly. “How d’you think the kids are doing with this?”

“Seemed right pleased to me, did they to you?”

“They did.” She rubs her foot against his. “Even Tom.”

“I noticed that.” He reciprocates. “Your father is pleased as punch of course." 

“Well, he got his wish.”

Alec can see a little twinge of regret in her eyes, just at knowing she’s done exactly what her father wanted.

They eat in silence for a moment, then she turns to him.

“Do you really want me to change my name?” She asks, her eyes searching his for an answer before he can give it.

He glances back at her. “Do you not?”

She tilts her head to the side in thought. “Be a bit confusing at work.”

“Everyone calls you Ellie anyway.”

“True." 

He puts his half-eaten salad down on the nightstand and turns to her. “I think it’s time you were really free from him. Don’t you?”

She looks down at her chips.

“El.” He stares at her until she finally looks at him. “I know the name’s become a part of who you are now and I know it doesn’t necessarily conjure him anymore, but it’s still…it’s his name. And you’re not his." 

“What about the boys?” Her eyes are wide and vulnerable. He realizes now that this has been her hesitation all along. Why she never went back to her maiden name.

And he understands, because this stumps him too. “…Dunno, love.” He kisses the side of her head. “Suppose they could become Hardys too…”

She looks up at him.

“If they wanted to,” he continues.

She smiles. Her eyes well up a bit. “Big change though. For Tom especially.”

“Well, we can ask them,” Alec suggests. “If they don’t want to change, then Miller it is. Plenty of mothers remarry and take a different name from their children.”

“I know. But it feels a bit different in this case,” she replies. “Don’t want to leave them alone with his name.”

“Okay.” He steals a chip off her plate. Not because he wants one, because he knows it will make her smile. It does. “Trade you for a tomato?”

She elbows him. “Get off with you.” He grins sheepishly and she snuggles against him. “Ellie Hardy isn’t…the worst thing I’ve ever heard though.”

His heart expands rapidly at the sound of it. “…No. It isn’t.”

“You really want it, don’t you?” The question is genuine and posed without judgment.

“I want what you want. Every part of this decision is yours. Yours and the boys’,” he replies. “I do think still think we should move though.”

She takes a breath. “…Right.”

“The past aside, we need the room, El,” he tells her.

“Yeah.” She nods, looking down. “I know.”

He observes her quietly for a moment, knowing that she’s sifting through fifteen years of complicated memories in that house.

“Hey.” He places a hand under her chin and draws her up to look at him. Then he reaches for her hip, guides her to turn and face him, both of them lying on their sides. “Don’t have to think any more on this now. Think we’ve made enough major life decisions for one week, yeah?”

She runs her hand up and down his arm. “Did I ever tell you about the absolutely _gruesome_ dream I had while we were investigating Danny?”

Alec frowns. _Why on earth…_

“Uh. No.”

She’s faintly smiling and he cannot imagine why. “It was…sometime in the middle there, dunno, hard to pinpoint, really but it was…oh, it must have been when we were looking at Paul Coates. I had a dream that you were fucking me in the church.”

His eyes widen.

“I kept trying to wake myself up, but I could not pull myself out of it. Against the wall, at the altar, a pew in the back.” Her cheeks grow a little flushed at the memory. “Eventually Joe had to wake me up. And I was so…that he had to…we.”

He frowns again. “What then?” 

She sighs. “He fucked me from behind and I pretended it was you.”

Alec’s jaw drops before his lips curve into a wicked smile. “You’re takin’ the piss.”

She shakes her head, now smiling herself. “No.”

“_Ellie_.” He reaches for her leg and pulls it up over his hip, needing her even closer.

“I couldn’t _look_ at you the next day, I was so mortified, so disgusted with myself. I hated you even more,” she admits. “It was awful.”

He’s grinning as he slides a hand up under her dress to cup her arse. “At the _altar_?”

“_Oh_ yeah.”

“Can’t believe you never told me before now.”

“Honestly, I think I’d mostly forgotten. So much from that time is now locked away,” she explains.

“Had a dream about _you_ once back then, too,” Alec says, leaning forward to kiss her softly. “Back when we were workin’ on Sandbrook.”

“You’re just going to make something up now,” she replies, running her fingers through his hair.

“No.” He shakes his head. “When we were stayin’ at the cottage and I slept on the sofa. In my dream you came downstairs in the middle of the night and woke me up so you could yell at me about somethin’. And you did, until suddenly we were tearin’ each other’s clothes off. I had my hand…” He slips his hand between her legs. “Here. And you shouted obscenities at me while I got you off.” 

She gasps as he slips a finger inside her. “_Oh_. That – that’s…”

“Thank christ I was the first one up that mornin’.”

Ellie pulls the hair at the back of his head and kisses him desperately, whimpering as his thumb finds her clit. “Oh, fuck,” she whispers into his mouth.

“Was worried I’d have dreams like that every night,” he whispers as she pants against him. “And we’d never get anythin’ done.” He slips another finger inside of her and she squirms, trying to open herself up to him as much as possible. “Sometimes to fall asleep I’d imagine what your skin would feel like. How warm…” He quickens his ministrations inside her. “How smooth.”

“Oh _god,_ Alec.”

He smiles, watching with rapt attention the look of wild desperation on her face. Then, in a move of impressive boldness, he removes his hand. Her gasp is loud in volume and totally pained. He pushes her onto her back and slides her dress all the way up. He crawls to the end of the bed and takes her in, her chest rising and falling rapidly, her face pink and eyes burning. 

“You are so beautiful,” he tells her, before parting her thighs. Her eyes locked with his, _begging_ him, pleading. He leans down, bringing his lips to her, and then his tongue. He holds her thighs apart as he laps at her, knowing she’s not going to last very long. He sucks on her clit and she’s already crying out, begging him not to stop. He places one hand flat on her stomach to steady her, knowing he’s about to unleash the combination of moves on her that unfailingly makes her scream. He gives it to her with twice the strength that he normally does and within seconds she’s screaming his name (this time, not just for Becca’s benefit) and then gasping for air.

And then. He does it again.

Her knees start to shake and her whole body is writhing, she covers her face with her hand and bites into her own finger. He doesn’t let up until she’s come a second time. Then he finally sits up, steadies her still shaking knees, and watches her. He gets up and grabs a napkin from the room service tray to clean him up and then approaches the bed again with a smug smile. She’s still panting, staring glossy-eyed at the ceiling, nearly sweating through her cotton dress. He crawls back onto the bed beside her.

“If nothing else,” he says, leaning against the headboard looking at down at her. “This baby is goin’ to come out of the womb intrinsically knowin’ _exactly_ how much Daddy loves Mummy.”

“Bollocks,” she exhales, then finally turns her head to look at him. “You are a smug bloody wanker is what you are.”

“Rightly so, I think.” He is indeed quite pleased with himself.

He moves to lie down beside her. She holds a hand up.

“Come near me again and I’ll have to kill you,” she says. She covers her face again. “Think I’ve lost sight in one eye.”

He ignores her and lies down next to her. “Next time I’ll shoot for both eyes.” 

She barely has the strength to, but she laughs. He reaches for her hand. They relax silently for a few moments.

“It’s a right lucky thing we didn’t know _then_ how good it would be between us or we’d never have slept,” she says finally.

“Not that either of us slept much anyway,” he adds.

With what little strength she has, she raises her left hand above her to admire her new engagement ring again.

“You've outdone yourself,” Ellie says admiringly. “_Many_ times today.”

“Well. You’ve got to carry a real, live baby inside you,” he replies, rubbing the back of her hand with his thumb. “I reckon anything I can do is still the very least I can do.”

He turns onto his side and drapes his arm over her torso, then leans his forehead against hers. She closes her eyes contentedly and he kisses her eyelid.

After a moment, she opens one eye and says, “Grab me my chips, will you? It’ll be another ten minutes at best before I can move again.”

He sits up and grabs the plate of chips from the bedside table and places them on the mattress next to her. With her eyes closed, she feels around for them, snags two, and shoves them into her mouth with a sigh.

He watches with great amusement. “My gorgeous fiancee.”

With a mouthful of chips, she says, “Bloody well right.”

**


End file.
